You mean the NeGcon?
According to wiki, the NeGcon was released in 1996, the Dual strike in 1999...
Edit: Namco NeGcon

It occurred to me that "complicated" could be interpreted in more than one way.

Most posts have been on difficulty to use, but technological sophistication is another possibility.

Kinect was nothing more than camera and a laser rangefinder, but it required an absurd amount of computaitonal processing, image recognition, pattern recognition and motion estimation algorithms in order to work.


The sheer difficulty in developing games that could take advantage of it (apart from gimmicks like the Star Wars galactic dance party), emphasies its complicated nature.


I've never used one, so I can't comment on its user friendliness - I'm not a console gamer. It has been discontinued, so it must not have been that popular.

A trackball mouse. I never could get the hang of moving the pointer with my thumb. I got more quickly adjusted with a HOTAS than those mice.

That's easy. Just map holding the button for different lengths of time to different inputs.
Huh? Can you recall any game that requires using all button groups simultaneously (or close enough that it requires shifting the grip quickly)?

Right hand for ABXY+R and left for either stick+Z or directional pad+L, depending on the game (although I've heard that some use pad in menus and stick for gameplay, but that doesn't require shifting between them that quickly). I think it feels fairly natural in either grip.

There are three types of trackball - depending on how they're built, you can control them with the thumb, fingers, or the flat of your hand, I prefer the two latter (even to a "regular" mouse), I've tried a thumb-controlled one (Logitech something?) and pretty much agree with you on that one. At home, I use a Kensington Expert Mouse (flat/fingers), at work I used to use a Microsoft Trackball Explorer (fingers) until it died and I switched to a RollerMouse (fingers/thumb) (not a trackball, more like a trackstick?).

And yes, I play games with the trackball. Even Diablo 2 and Unreal which both require a bit of precision and speed. I'm no worse than with a mouse, then again, I wasn't very good to begin with.

I use a trackball for everything. It is superior to a mouse because it doesn't move, so it doesn't need a pad. I'm not sure why you (both) have trouble using it, since it is perfectly intuitive. Then again, perhaps I'm just a fast learner, since I brush my teeth with either hand.

What about The Woz's paddles? (Steve Wozniak, co-inventor of the Apple pc, who was shafted by Steve Jobs, invented the paddle interface that came in pairs and each was a linear controller. One was used to move vertically and the other horizontally, like the two dials on an Etch-a-Sketch, it that helps.)

It's just the way different brains are wired. I picked up juggling pretty quick with either hand, and lock picking is easy. The thumb trackball just didn't work for me.

Has anyone tried out that Tap Strap? The thing that let's you type without a keyboard by registering the movements of your fingers on the one hand?

No, but I am reminded of an esoteric typing device, it was a device that you'd put your hand on and sort of do an early version of gesture typing. I think a famous science fiction author used it.

What about travel and tactile feedback? That sounds as bad as typing on a touchpad. :P